Anatta
by Bar Sira
Summary: Extended story fragment. Has anyone noticed what, ontologically, the whole IO setup really implies about humanity? Or wondered what it might be like if one of the emotions brought herself to face it?
1. Anatta

**Disclaimer:** They're all yours, Pete Docter; use them well.

 **Author's note:** When I wrote this first semi-chapter, I felt far too strongly about the central philosophic point involved to waste time with setup, so the story begins about as _in medias res_ as a story can. (Indeed, at the time, I wasn't at all sure that I would ever expand on it even to the extent that I now have.) So here's the background: An accident on the hockey rink sends Riley into a coma (causing a power surge in the console that sends Anger, who happened to be steering at the time, into the infirmary). In a desperate attempt to find out what's going on, the emotions work out a system of long-range communication with Dream Production and Sensory Input, and manage to get a setup cobbled together that allows them to at least take in auditory data - just in time to overhear the doctor and Riley's parents seriously discussing withdrawing life support. Which leads us to…

* * *

"What – no!" Joy exclaimed. "They can't pull the plug! We're still in here! Riley could still pull through! They have to keep her going!"

"I don't know, Joy," Sadness said slowly. "She's pretty much gone already; maybe it would be better just to get it over with."

With an effort, Joy swallowed the sharp retort she wanted to make. She and Sadness had gone through a great deal in order to understand each other; she didn't want to throw that away now. Instead, with all the gentle reasonableness she could muster, she said, "Sadness, _ple-e-e-ease_ don't talk that way. I get where you're coming from, but it's really not what we want right now."

"Oh," said Sadness. "Okay."

Then, after a moment's thought: "Why not?"

"Because this isn't just about Riley feeling one thing or another," said Joy. "It's about whether she'll ever feel _anything_ after Saturday. So long as her heart keeps beating, there's a chance of that – so we've _all_ got to hope for that, or…"

"Oh, give it a rest, Joy," said a tart voice from behind them.

Joy and Sadness slowly turned around, and their eyes met those of the green emotion leaning apathetically against the idea wall. "Excuse me?" Joy demanded.

"You heard me," said Disgust. "I'll hope for anything you want, but for Pete's sake stop acting like it's this big, important thing."

"Disgust, what are you saying?" said Fear. "Of course it's important! This is Riley we're talking about!"

"My point exactly," said Disgust. "What's so important about Riley?"

The other emotions exchanged glances. "Disgust, are you sure that surge missed you?" said Joy.

"I'm not crazy, Joy," Disgust retorted. "I know we've always _pretended_ that making Riley's life come out right is the most important thing there is. We've _pretended_ that she's a real person, with a heart and mind that need protecting."

"Well, isn't she?" said Sadness.

"What do you think?" said Disgust. "Look at that!" She pointed to the console. "We've spent fifteen years dictating her every action with that thing; her identity's powered by memories that you and Joy made; we even decide what ideas she has." (Here she pulled an idea off the shelf behind her and held it up for emphasis.) "If she were a person, do you think we could do all that? People have their own ideas, pick their own actions; that's what makes them people."

She saw realization dawning in her colleagues' shell-shocked faces, and pushed forward ruthlessly. "Riley's a toy, you guys. That's all she's ever been; it's all any of them are – big, complicated action figures, waiting for us to play our little games of Quintuple Delectation with them. It's only because we're so obsessed with that game that we ever thought she was anything more."

She sighed, and slumped back against the wall, looking suddenly dull and withered. "And I'm not saying I'm any different," she said. "I care about Riley's flourishing more than anything; it's all I've ever existed for, after all. But, after what's happened, I'm sick of pretending that it makes sense."


	2. Maya

Late that evening, Joy was leaning against the console, staring vacantly up at the colored flickers that Dream Production was still valiantly transmitting, when she heard a familiar heavy footfall behind her. She turned, and, despite all the burdens weighing on her spirit, managed to produce a smile for her hard-made friend. "Hey, Sadness. How's Anger?"

"He's doing a lot better," said Sadness. "You know how last night he cried on my shoulder and said how happy he was to have a friend like me? Well, just now when I was there, he spent the whole time grumbling about how much Mom and Dad need to sue the Oakland team for; I don't think he even noticed when I left." And she gave Joy the closest thing her face could manage to a knowing grin.

Joy grinned, too. "So, almost himself again?"

"Just about," said Sadness. "I think he'll be on his feet by tomorrow afternoon."

"Well, that's good."

There was a moment's pregnant silence, then, which Sadness broke after a second or two by asking, hesitantly, "Do you think she's right?" She didn't have to specify who, or about what.

Joy sighed. "I don't know," she said. "It sounded true when she said it – like something we'd always known, and just agreed not to talk about. But…"

"I know," said Sadness. "Like when we got back from the fair last summer."

Joy blinked at this unexpected _non sequitur_. "What does the fair have to do with it?"

Sadness hesitated. "Well, nothing, really, I guess," she said. "It's just the example I thought of. You know, the end of a really good day, when, just as Riley's going to bed, we all look at each other and think how lucky we are to be together – the five of us, here in Headquarters, with something we love to do and such great people to do it with. You know about that, don't you?"

Joy bit her lip, and nodded. She knew, all right; it was something she'd been trying not to think about for days – ever since it had started to look as though it would never happen again.

"Well, that's what I thought of when she was talking," Sadness said. "Because I always think, at times like that, that it's so sad how Riley, and Mom and Dad, and all the others outside, can't ever have that feeling. I always figured it was just because they're not emotions, and don't have that built-in mission we do, but now I think maybe it's what Disgust said – that they can't take joy in each other the way we can, because they're not real people the way we are."

 _And that, Joy,_ the luminous emotion thought, _is why Sadness was brought into your life. You'd never in a million years have noticed that on your own, but she's absolutely right: whenever you're soothing Anger or playing I Spy with Fear and Disgust, you have that same feeling of, "If only Riley could be here, too." In fact, that's probably why you used to insist so much that she always needed to be happy: she was missing the best thing of all, so you had to make sure she had everything else she could._

"But what does that mean, then?" she said. "If Riley's not real, what do we _do_? And what's going to happen when… when…"

She couldn't bring herself to say it, but Sadness knew what she meant, and shook her head. "I don't know, Joy," she said. "I'm sorry; I wish I did, but…" She looked down at the floor, and repeated softly, "I don't know."

* * *

A few yards away, in one of the five small bedchambers above the idea library, lay someone else who didn't know, and who, for all her air of over-it-all apathy that afternoon, was just as distressed by the fact as her sisters were. Disgust wanted nothing more than just to fall asleep and forget the world for a few hours, but her irrational concern for Riley, combined with her gnawing hunger (her refusal to touch the slop from the IV tubes was starting to take its toll), prevented any such happy consummation; all she could do was toss and turn in her bed, squeezing her eyes shut so tightly that they almost hurt, and feeling the impotent sourness that filled both her mind and her belly wash over her poor consciousness like a surf made of rancid milk. (And the fact that she experienced it in exactly those terms didn't help matters at all. There were times when she almost hated her role in Riley's psyche; it was bad enough to have nights like this, but to be so vividly aware of all their fine shades of wretchedness was a gift she really could have done without. Why couldn't she be Attraction now and then, and maybe be able to see the nice side of things for a change?)

Then, as her brain was re-re-replaying that poem Riley had read in fifth grade about the thousand thousand slimy things, she heard a soft, diffident knock on her bedchamber door. She clenched her teeth, and moaned softly behind them; if there was one thing that she, in this mood, hated even more than being alone with her thoughts, it was having to deal with other people.

"Who is it?" she said.

"Me," came Fear's voice. "I was just thinking… um… can I come in?"

"I don't know," said Disgust waspishly. "Has your hand been paralyzed since I last saw you, and lost its ability to turn the doorknob?"

"Well…" There was a moment's pause, and she just knew that Fear was flexing his hand experimentally. "No. But what I mean is, would you mind… because, you know, coming into a girl's room without checking first…"

"Oh, _please_ , Fear," Disgust groaned. "You know I haven't undressed in fifteen years; why are you getting so gentlemanly _now_?"

"So… that's a yes, then?"

Disgust sighed. "Come in."

She heard the creak of the door, and wrenched her eyes open to see her ianthine colleague timidly approach the foot of her bed. Apart from the dishevelment of his eyebrows, he looked obnoxiously good for the hour and the circumstances; Disgust briefly contemplated throwing her lamp at him, but decided that that required more energy than she could summon.

"So what's the big news, Fear?" she said.

Fear tapped his fingers together uncertainly. "Well, I don't know about _news_ , really," he said. "It's just that I was thinking about what you said earlier – you know, about Riley? – and it occurred to me… and of course it's probably occurred to you too, but I just thought maybe…"

Disgust rolled her eyes. "Spit it out, Fear," she said – adding, as an afterthought, "Though not literally, because… ew."

"Right, of course," said Fear. "Well, here's what it is, then. I hear what you're saying about Riley, and of course you're right; when you look at things objectively, she really is more like a big computer game than a person." (Disgust wondered whether any of the rest of them could have said that in the matter-of-fact tone he did; it was as though, having spent his whole life imagining the worst, he could accept the ultimate existential appall with perfect ease, as being just the sort of thing he always expected.) "But then what you have to ask is, who built the game?"

Disgust shrugged. "Broderbund?"

Fear gave her a long-suffering look. "Come on, Disgust," he said. "This is important. Riley's been our whole life; if she's a game, then whoever made her is the most important person in the world. It's not like James Creighton setting up the rules for hockey, and then other people deciding they wanted in; like you said this afternoon, we've never existed _except_ to play the Riley Game, so whoever made it must have made us, too. And if there's somebody out there who can _make people_ just to play his game… you see?"

"See what?" said Disgust irritably. (In fact, she did see something, but she didn't feel like making the effort to think it out.)

"That we've got to find out who he is, and what he wants!" said Fear. "What if there's a crazed maniac out there who's trying to build an emotion-control device for the Russians, and we're his prototypes? We could be aiding the invasion of America right this minute!"

Disgust stared at him for a long moment, reflecting sourly that this was what you got when you let Fear do your thinking for you. "Okay," she said. "First of all, if Riley's not real – if what we see on the screen out there is just a simulation – how do you know that Russia and America are real? And second…"

"That's even worse!" said Fear. "That means we're the Matrix! Some homicidal robot has our brains in a vat three centuries from now, and we're just letting it happen! How can we…"

Disgust cleared her throat. "May I finish, Fear?"

"Oh." Fear colored. "Right. Sorry."

"Second," Disgust continued, "you do realize, right, that it's taking all my instincts right now just to keep me caring about Riley? There's no reason for it, that I can see; I'm just doing it because I'm an idiot who can't let go of her favorite toy all at once. Now, if that's where I am with Riley, where do you think I am with America? If it's real, then it's the place that wants my human to drop dead so it can give her hospital bed to someone who really matters. America can go jump off a cliff, for all I care."

"Well, that's… that's not really fair, Disgust," said Fear. "I mean, we all know San Francisco has weird ideas about human dignity; you can't judge the whole country by…" He trailed off under her silent glare. "Right, right. Sure. I get it."

He drummed his fingers on the footboard of Disgust's bed, and seemed to be pondering his next words. At length, he managed, "So what _do_ you care about now? If it's not Riley much longer, and it's not anything else outside… what is it?"

Disgust's first impulse, prompted by the sour barrenness that was still overwhelming her spirit, was to reply that there wasn't anything – but that, she realized, wasn't really true. There _was_ something that still mattered to her, though it was almost too vague to identify – something to do with New Honesty Island, and all Mom's talk lately about true womanhood…

"I guess I care about being a good emotion," she said slowly. "Or, anyway, a good… well, whatever we really are. A good _me_."

Fear nodded. "Makes sense," he said. "So you think that's our first job, then? To find out what we really are?"

"I guess," said Disgust wearily. "But please, Fear: not tonight. I don't…"

"Oh, right," said Fear hastily. "I didn't mean that. I know it's not the time for… or even for… um…" He paused, and glanced around the room with a sudden access of apparent surprise. "You know what?" he said. "Maybe I should get out of here and let you rest."

"Maybe," Disgust agreed.

"Mm-hmm," said Fear. "Okay, then. Um… good night."

"'Night."

* * *

Fear tiptoed out of the room and eased the door shut, and Disgust pulled her covers back over her head and readdressed herself to her quest for sleep. But this proved even harder than before, for the ideas with which her brother had filled her head were just the sort to prey endlessly upon a restless emotion's mind.

So she wanted to be a good Disgust, did she? She wanted to find out what she really was, and then be that in such a way as to make that being worthwhile? All very easy to say, that – but how, exactly, did she propose to go about it? If all she knew was that she wasn't what she appeared to be – that the girl she'd always lived for was a mere illusion, and everything that surrounded her presumably a prop to keep her thus illuded – where was she supposed to look to find reality? –For that matter, was she even sure that she was real herself?

Well, yes. Of course she was. If she weren't real, how could she even wonder whether she was or not? Stupid question.

 _Ah,_ said a voice in the back of her head, _but are you real_ _enough_ _?_

And that made her even sicker to her stomach than she'd already been. Because that wasn't a stupid question at all; on the contrary, she knew instinctively that it was _the_ question. Was she real enough; was there enough of her – of all of them – to do what they needed to do? And, if there wasn't, how were they supposed to get enough reality to do it?

There was only one answer that Disgust could think of – an answer that might, for all she knew, have been part of the illusion itself, but that felt more like what reality ought to be than anything else she knew. For the first time since age eight, a part of Riley Anderson rolled out of her bed, propped herself against it on her knees, and whispered the old words that their late grandmother had taught them, all those years before.

 _Now I lay me down to sleep,  
_ _I pray the Lord my soul to keep.  
_ _Guide me safely through the night,  
_ _And bless me with the morning's light.  
_ _Amen._

* * *

And thus it happened that, some ten minutes later, when Joy, in retiring, briefly mistook the door of Disgust's bedchamber for that of her own, she saw her youngest sibling still kneeling there, with her head and folded hands lying inert upon the bed, and an unmistakable snore issuing from her lips. With a barely stifled giggle, she went over, lifted her back into bed, and tucked her in; then, after a moment's pause, she leaned over and gave her a tiny kiss on the forehead.

"Sweet dreams, Disgust," she whispered. "I know it's not likely, but I hope it happens anyway. If we're all we've got left, then every good thing any of us have is precious, so… sweet dreams."

And she slipped out of Disgust's bedchamber into her own; the door closed behind her, and all was dark and still once again.


End file.
